SCA vs Flyway vs Redgate Deploy

EricLamontagne

Hi,

I'm a bit confused about all these options. I've been using SCA for the last 8 months and lately I'm seeing many articles about flyway for database migration. I also see that there is Redgate deploy. How do they compare? Are they complementary solutions or they replace each other?

Regards,

Confused User

Kendra_Little

Hi @EricLamontagne ,

Thanks for this question. This is something that I have been meaning to blog about a bit to help our existing  users understand how these things relate to one another. 

Essentially, what we find is that new customers who are getting used to our tooling get overwhelmed if we start throwing a lot of product names at them. Instead, they just want to initially know: what are the capabilities that you offer? 

But for customers who are already with us and who are already familiar with some products, this can be a bit confusing as you already know the product names and want to know how they work together.

The shorter version of the answer is:

• Redgate Deploy is a subscription offering. It contains SQL Change Automation and Flyway (along with other tools).  
• SQL Change Automation's strength is that is offers many more features for SQL Server users than Flyway does: SQL Change Automation helps you author scripts, automatically numbers them, helps identify merge conflicts, and performs full CI/CD support including testing, code analysis, etc. 
• Flyway, on the other hand, is a tool that helps you automate deployments (a subset of that functionality) -- Flyway's strength is that it works with many databases.

Here's a more detailed version of how these all relate:

What is Redgate Deploy?

Redgate Deploy is a subscription-based solution for versioning and Continuous Integration / Continuous Delivery for databases.

Redgate Deploy has features for version control, automatic script authoring, continuous integration  (including  unit testing and code analysis), automated deployments, drift detection, and database virtualization (cloning)

Redgate Deploy SQL Server Components

To implement versioning and CI/CD for SQL Server, Redgate Deploy users can create database projects using SQL Source Control or SQL Change Automation, depending on the team's preferred style of working. If teams wish to take on a "combined" approach, they can even combine these types of projects into a single workflow. Fully automated builds, tests, code analysis, and deployments are done by  SQL Change Automation.

Additionally, Redgate Deploy contains SQL Compare and SQL Data Compare both for interactive use, or for use in automation via command lines.

SQL Clone is included to support ephemeral database creation, both for development environments as well as development, test, and pipeline automation scenarios such as Pull Requests.

Redgate Deploy Oracle Components

To implement versioning and CI/CD for Oracle, Redgate Deploy users can create database projects using Source Control for Oracle or Redgate Change Control, again based on the team's preferred style of working. A combined approach with these projects is also available. Deployment automation can be run by Redgate Change Automation.

Redgate Deploy contains Schema Compare for Oracle and Data Compare for Oracle for investigative/interactive use, and these can also be used in command line automation to supplement pipelines as desired.

Data virtualization for Oracle databases is planned to become available in Redgate Deploy in the second half of 2021.

Redgate Deploy Support for 18 Additional Databases

Redgate Deploy also includes Flyway to provide deployment automation support for additional databases: PostgreSQL, MySQL, DB2, Aurora MySQL, MariaDB, Percona XtraDB Cluster, Aurora PostgreSQL, Redshift, CockroachDB, SAP HANA, Sybase ASE, Informix, H2, HSQLDB, Derby, Snowflake, SQLite, Firebird.

While Flyway also works for SQL Server and Oracle, for most projects we find that customers will choose the specific SQL Server or Oracle components listed above, as they not only save time by helping author the code which will be deployed, they also offer much richer CI/CD support.

Hope this helps, and very happy to answer any questions!
Kendra

Edit 20200217 - used "SQL Server" when I meant "Oracle" in one spot 😂

EricLamontagne

Thank you Kendra!

john123456

@Kendra_Little So, after seeing the post in 2022 about SQL Change automation becoming flyway desktop, is it safe to say that all strengths that SQL Change Automation had over Flyway in 2021 have now been incorporated into Flyway?

David Atkinson

@john123456 - Yes, this is the idea. But whether Flyway has the necessary strengths for you is dependent on the way you work. Are you using a state-based or migrations-based deployment strategy, for example? If you can describe how you use SCA today, we'd be in a better position to advise on whether Flyway now has the capabilities you need.

john123456

I see -- Well, we are building a new cloud based application, so we are trying to decide between state or change based...

If SCA is on a track for end of life, and Flyway will eventually have everything SCA does, then I don't see why we'd chose SCA.